communicate :: collaborate :: commemorate

It's been about six weeks with the Sen.se ThermoPeanut and my initial enthusiasm has been superseded by disappointment. Yes, it is easy to setup, yes it does work. But unfortunately not in any useful capacity to me.

Ever since the Eve Weather revealed it's disappointing Bluetooth range, I wanted something else to track the outside temperature. The ThermoPeanut isn't IP rated meaning it can only really be used indoors. But I have one Belkin Netcam HD which has survived three years outside and I attached the ThermoPeanut to its mount. Unlike the Eve Weather, it never showed connection issues. Remember, both use Bluetooth. Where the Peanut connects, the Eve fails. I was happy.

Ten days later, the ThermoPeanut was unresponsive. The battery which should have lasted six months was dead.

So I replaced the battery and tried again. Ten days later, it was dead again.

I asked for a second sample and put that outdoors, under the roof. I took the first sample indoors. Both with a new battery. Ten days later the new peanut was dead, the old one was doing fine. Now I knew that I could not put the peanut outside without burning a CR2032 in less than two weeks.

I only took the first sample indoors as a control case. I don't need to record the inside temperature because that is a steady 22 degrees Celsius, plus or minus half a degree, no matter what happens outside. Now I have put them in the fridge and it shows a steady 4 degrees for one zone and -18 for the other. If the fridge leaves its target temperature zone and cannot come back (door open) it starts beeping. The peanuts don't add anything there.